Maple Leaf Forever
by SlytherinDemigod18
Summary: He's had many birthdays over the years.


**Here's me, being patriotic and stuff. This one's for you, Maple Boi**

Matthew remembers his first birthday.

Well, this wasn't his country's, per se, but _his_, millennia ago when everything was still innocent to him.

It's his first memory, actually. He and his brother, the New World countries of America and Canada long before the Europeans arrived, cradled in their mother's arms as she cried soft tears, knowing this was the beginning of her end but not wanting to spoil her sons' birthday.

Matthew and Alfred were so small, didn't know anything about the world beyond what their mother whispered to them as they nestled against her collarbone and the warmth of the fire washed over them in a comforting blanket.

oO0Oo

When France discovers him on the banks of Gaspé, Matthew looks like a child but has lived for hundreds of years.

Since his brother was taken away by a green-eyed man a year before, his mother hadn't been the same. Matthew's eyes sting as he remembers how his mother had disappeared before his eyes only days before, thanks to the discovery of their countries by men who's languages and customs were foreign to them.

With his mother gone and a new world brimming on the horizon for the New World countries, Matthew and Alfred have gained what was once their mother's people, but it's strange because they can feel their people - the new ones - there with them too, and the conflicting emotions from both sides makes Matthew's heart break. He wonders if it will always be like that from then on.

So when France picks him up for the first time and cradles him in his arms like Matthew can remember his mother doing, he wonders if this will be a new birthday for a new beginning.

oO0Oo

The sound of cannons still echoes in Matthew's ears when he's roughly pushed into England's arms without so much as a goodbye from the country who used to be his _papa_. The only sound in the dusty, burnt-out hallway is the groaning of the wooden supports as they settle from the constant bombardments of the past week and the clacking of France's shoes against the debris littering the floor. Matthew isn't even sure if he's crying - doesn't even know if he has any left to cry.

oO0Oo

At Arthur's house, Matthew is reunited with his brother for the first time in decades, but they are like strangers now. They might want with all their hearts to reconnect and reunite, but the fact is that they _can't_. Alfred doesn't remember how to speak in the languages their mother taught them, and Matthew doesn't speak English.

But he learns, and soon they remember what they used to be. He's introduced to the other members of England's household - his neighbours of Nove Scotia, Newfoundland, Rupert's Land, and what would later be called Prince Edward Island, and people he'd never met who introduced themselves as India and Barbados and several others.

So the province of Canada joins British North America and the British Empire, and it's a new sort of birthday for a new start.

oO0Oo

His brother leaves on a ship bound for his land one bright sunny day a few years later and doesn't come back. In his stead is a letter declaring the independence of the Thirteen Colonies and the beginning of the American Revolution.

Matthew feels like his heart is being torn to pieces. Alfred is his brother and that demands a higher loyalty than anything, but just as the province of Canada is bound to the Empire, so is Matthew and there's nothing he can do about it.

He doesn't celebrate his birthday that year, and the date gets forgotten forever.

oO0Oo

Matthew's birthday, the one he celebrates every year with his citizens, doesn't arrive for a hundred years. It's after his brother's revolution, after the civil war, and after Canada has been a British colony for more than a hundred years. He, the United Colony of Canada, and the colonies of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick sat down together with the delegates and created the Confederation.

Matthew didn't know until later that with the assimilation of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia into his country, his friends would be gone forever. Didn't know until the older boys - both of whom looked like adults to Matthew's scrawny sixteen - gave him a sad sort of smile and dissolved into a shower of golden dust.

It was eerily similar to how Matthew's mother had left him so many years before, and Matthew broke down crying. If that is what having his own country meant, he didn't want it. He just wanted his friends back.

Through his own sobs, Matthew heard the quiet cries of someone else in the room. He blinked open his eyes and through his tears saw what having his own country _really_ meant.

Four small children, infants only a few months old at most, lying in small woven cradles on the wooden floor of the empty conference room. Matthew bit his trembling lip and with a shaky hand, reached out to caress the cheek of the redhead boy.

_Nova Scotia, _his mind supplied.

_Ontario_

_New Brunswick_

_Quebec_

His two friends, born again as children with no recollection of what they'd once been. They were now the provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick and Matthew's responsibility. And there were two new ones, Ontario and Quebec, who made up what was formerly Matthew's colony.

It was weird and complicated, to say the least, but Matthew was now a father of four at sixteen (which was really several hundred years old), and the meaning of his birthday had just gotten so much bigger.

oO0Oo

Prince Edward Island, a little freckled baby girl, joins the Confederation six years later on the same day, and Matthew can see her former life in her as she coos and babbles.

oO0Oo

The first international phone call was made, and Matthew and his brother were the first to experience it.

Matthew called his brother from New Brunswick, and Alfred picked it up in Maine. They're not even two kilometres away from each other, yet they're talking quickly, rambling and tripping over words and interrupting each other. This is a big thing, a significant development in modern technology, and they both knew it.

Alfred ends the call with, "And by the way, Happy Birthday, Bro."

Matthew feels like he could fly.

oO0Oo

His fiftieth birthday is spent wading through blood and gore amid a rain of bullets. It's a milestone, a country's fiftieth birthday, but Matthew isn't even at home. He wishes he could be - _god, how he wishes_, but he has to do his duty to the Empire and so he's fighting in foreign lands away from everything he knows.

He ducks into a crater as a shell explodes to his left, sending mud and blood flying through the air. Matthew squeezes his eyes shut and, just for a moment, pretends he's back at home with his kids. The letter they'd sent to him months before so it would arrive in time is tucked safely in his breast pocket.

They were the only ones who'd wished him a happy birthday. He'd mentioned the date to Arthur, but the man had just patted him sadly on the shoulder and handed him a gun. Alfred hadn't even noticed, and his _papa_ was no doubt lying in bed, rolling over in agony at the scars that were being inflicted on his land.

Still, Matthew thought about the letter and made everything marginally better. It was a flickering light of happiness in the gloom and smog of the battlefield.

It wasn't until after the battle ended that he learned about what happened at Beaumont Hamel on his birthday and the fate of the Newfoundland Regiment.

oO0Oo

His birthdays' after the war were quiet affairs. Just him and his citizens and his children. He didn't know many of his fellow nations, just the colonies and dominions of the British Empire, France, and his brother.

France always sends him a beautiful card written in _F__rançais_, and Arthur gives him an awkward pat on the back and a small gift when he goes for the next conference with the Empire. Alfred's cards are always late, but that's okay.

His has his kids who shower him with affection and there are six birthday cakes on the table with an ever-increasing number of candles, and that's all Matthew really needs.

oO0Oo

Matthew reigns his horse in as he stares at the strikers beneath his broad-brimmed campaign hat, painfully aware of the scarlet uniform glaring down at the people below.

His horse, as if sensing his internal distress, titters nervously and backs into a striker behind Matthew. Matthew turns around and hs an apology forming on his lips, but the man - the man who'd only wanted a fair wage and fair hours - was glaring at him even as he moves to get out of range of Matthew's baton.

There's a lump in his throat that he can't swallow and the warring emotions within him and threatening to spill over his eyes, but he has to present a united front with his RMCP. It's his duty as a country.

And yet as he watches them once more, he can't help but wish that he was on their side.

It wasn't how he envisioned his birthday at all.

oO0Oo

Matthew spent his seventy-sixth birthday preparing the rain the coast of Sicily in Operation _Husky_, so many miles from home and so alone.

That year, it was too busy to send birthday cards.

oO0Oo

On his birthday in 1958, the CBC links TV broadcasting all across Canada. Matthew and his kids spent the evening eating cake in front of their new television and laughing at the programs that were played, even as his side itched from the flooding of the Saint-Lawrence Seaway.

Birthday cards from Alfred, Francis, and Arthur sat on the end table beside Matthew, and they seemed to make the whole room lighter.

oO0Oo

The first time 'O Canada' is sung as his national anthem as opposed to 'God Save the Queen', Matthew can hardly get out the words for smiling, and the tears on his face are from happiness. Matthew never thought he would ever be tired of the majesty of hearing that anthem.

That is, until Alberta decides to learn to play it on the trumpet.

oO0Oo

In 1990, the border patrols along the Berlin wall ended officially as East Germany adopted the currency of West Germany.

Matthew stood there with many of his fellow nations, watching and waiting for Prussia to limp over the wall and rejoin them for the first time in decades.

Matthew was particularly excited because he remembers the man from when he'd been France's colony, and had a proposition for the man that involved a chunk of land in New Prussia, Ontario. That was the _only_ reason Matthew was excited to see him, no matter how many times British Columbia and Manitoba teased him about having a crush.

oO0Oo

His 150th birthday was marked with an unprecedented celebration. His citizens swarmed the streets like never before, held bigger parties than in previous years, and there were more Canada regalia in the stores than Matthew had _ever _seen.

Honestly, Matthew doesn't remember much about that birthday. The adrenaline was pumping and spirits were high and it clouded Matthew's head in the best way possible.

He woke up on the couch the next morning wearing a big maple leaf costume, smelling like smoke, and with a pounding headache, so he figured there was a good story there.

oO0Oo

Even though his kids wanted to have a big, all-out birthday party for their dad, Matthew had opted for a (relatively) small celebration with just his family and friends. The G8 nations (and Prussia, because he never turned down a party) were there, as well as his brother and his states, Francis and Arthur, and his former colonial siblings.

They spent the day downtown - Matthew convinced them all to try poutine - as Matthew and his kids gave them a historical tour of the city of Ottawa. When it turned dark, they found their way up to Parliament Hill as Matthew did every year, and settled down on the blankets, double-doubles and ice capps in hand to watch the fireworks explode into existence.

Matthew leaned back with his arm tucked under his head and breathed in the excitement and patriotism humming in the air. He was now one-hundred and fifty-two years old, still young in the eyes of nations, but he felt so much older.

Even though he'd been born on a different day and had claimed so many other days as his birthday, _this_ day was special. Five of his kids had been born on this day, and that was enough to make it special, but he'd done so many other things too. And everything he did, he did it as a country doing it for his people, but on this day, his people did it all for their country.

And as he watched a red firework burst into existence in the pattern of a maple leaf, he realized that was the best feeling to have.


End file.
